Path of Broken Pieces
by Shini the megami
Summary: When bad things happen, they can either break you or make you stronger. And, in the case of the former, sometimes you can find it in you to pick up the broken pieces and make something better with them. Rating may be subject to change. DISCONTINUED


**Path of Broken Pieces **

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Naruto in any way, shape, or form, so please don't sue me. I have zero money anyway.

**Author's Notes:** Ok, so, this is a back story/side fic for my other story, Down the Shinobi's Path. I don't think you have to read them in any particular order to understand what's going on. I'm pretty sure this fic can stand alone, but we'll see. I'd be very, very happy if you read both stories though. Anyway, I guess you could call this a sort of Gai back story too, because he's featured in this story as well. I think that's all I needed to say.

**Warnings:** There is alcohol abuse near the beginning of this chapter. Also there is a bit of angst in this chapter. Probably violence, language, and death as it takes place during a war and it's about ninja.

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**Prologue: Finding the Right Path**

It started, as every life starts, with a birth. But this birth came with a price. Not endless hours of no sleep, or feedings at ungodly hours, or smelly diapers, or babies that just won't stop crying. Though, this life came with that too. The price was greater than that, it was a life. A life for a life.

Ishida Kenji stared down at his wife; she looked so peaceful, like she was sleeping. She was pale, long black hair damp and sticking to her face with sweat. 'Wake up,' he pleaded. Her full lips were parted, but no breath was drawn through them. 'Wake up, wake up.' She looked so peaceful. 'Open you eyes Yuuki! It's not supposed to be like this!' There was supposed to be blood and gore and pain and rage! That was the death he's used to! Not this! But she's dead all the same. He doesn't cry though. Because ninja don't cry; and he's anything if not a good ninja.

Now, they've given him his new daughter and he looks down at her. Down into tear blurred steel colored eyes, down at her thin damp black hair. At her full bow lips, her pink skin. She was beautiful. They ask him for the baby girl's name, "Nadeshiko," he says. That was the name his wife wanted; he, on the other hand, rather disliked it. He never told her, always being bad with words. Yuuki understood though, she always was, no, is very understanding. Even when it came to the things he had to do as a ninja. Even when civilians usually didn't. He never told her, but she always knew. "I love you," he tells her, not even a whisper, too late. He'll never love another woman again, he swears it.

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Yuuki's family, all civilians, blames Kenji for her death, for taking her away from them. They'd been against Yuuki and his marriage from the beginning. But Kenji doesn't need them to tell him it was his fault; he already knew that it was he who killed his wife, knew the moment she breathed her last. Her family had told them to wait to get married, after all Yuuki was only seventeen and he was only twenty. "If you love her then you'll wait," they told him. But that was it wasn't it, he didn't wait. He let Yuuki talk him into eloping and now she's dead. He _had_ loved her, loved her more than he ever thought possible, just…not enough. 

He keeps thinking about it, about how it was his fault she's dead, and he tells himself that he could have prevented her death. But it was too late; he was always too late. Yuuki wasn't coming back and that knowledge tore him apart inside. So he drinks, drinks to forget, drinks to be numb. He just wanted to be numb, physically, emotionally, he didn't care; he didn't want to feel anymore, because he's sure the pain of it all will kill him. That he'll bleed to death from it. And he's sure Nadeshiko is going to grow up to look like Yuuki and that made the wound bigger. She would be a living reminder of his dead wife and of his murder of her. So he drinks more, because he can't stand that thought, wanting that blissful darkness where nothing can reach him that only alcohol can bring him.

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Ishida Hatori and Makoto walked silently home after their mission. It was a regular everyday C-rank mission, just go and pick up a scroll from some guy and deliver it to the Hokage. They hadn't run into any trouble, which they had expected as this was their first mission as Chunin and they didn't think they would be given a mission that was too difficult. They had just gotten back to Konoha a little late, night having already fallen by the time they were done with the debriefing. They were in no great hurry to get home though, they, in fact, would rather not be at home; they stay anyway to help take care of their baby sister. It had been a very sad couple of months since their sister was born, what with their mother dying, and sometimes the depressed atmosphere in their house was too unbearable to stay there. Sometimes it was hard for them to believe that their mother was really dead. They had expected to lose their father far sooner than their mother, had expected to die before their mother died. Now, the opposite was true. 

At thirteen Makoto and Hatori, nearly identical in looks, were a bit scrawny and small, having not hit their growth spurt yet. They had black hair that stuck up in almost every direction and even blacker eyes. They wore Chunin vests over their clothes.

When they finally did get home, in too short a time, something struck Makoto as being very wrong as he opened the door. The lights in the sitting room were dimmed and he could hear Nadeshiko crying in her room, the air in the house was heavy with the smell of alcohol. But, what alarmed Makoto the most was the large prone figure of a bear sized man, with a mass of tangled dark brown hair and stubble covered lower face, on their couch.

Makoto hurried over to his father, his stomach doing odd flips, he grabbed one of the man's large shoulders and shook him. "Dad?" he called, yet nothing happened. Something was very, very wrong. Ninja were usually light sleepers, but his father wasn't waking up. His breathing was too shallow, too slow for Makoto's comfort and when he touched his father's shoulder it was cold and clammy. Makoto turned the lights all the way on so he could better see his father; his insides gave a twist when he saw the bluish look of the man's skin. 'This isn't normal, this isn't good! We have to get him help!' was one of the thoughts racing through his mind, 'Now!'

Makoto tried to hoist his father up, but the man was too big, too heavy for the younger, smaller boy to hold up, not to mention he would be a dead weight. There was _no way_ Makoto would be able to carry his father to the hospital. But he had to get him help, his father would die if he didn't get help, Makoto was sure of it. And his father's breathes were getting slower and shallower the longer they stood there. Makoto suddenly turned to his brother still standing near the door, as if just remembering he was there. Hatori stood frozen, pale faced and scared looking, mirroring on the outside what Makoto felt on the inside. "Tori, get help, get help!" he shouted at his twin. Hatori stood rooted there a few seconds more before turning swiftly around and running out the door. Makoto watched him leave for a second or two before turning back to his father. He found himself praying to gods that were probably not even listening anymore, after everything that's happened these past few months, that they didn't lose the father so soon after their mother.

* * *

It was bright, bright enough that he could see it through his eyelids, which meant it was _far too_ bright. He was lying on his back too, he hated being on his back. And on top of it all his head was pounding, he was so nauseous his stomach threatened to upturn itself if he dared to even twitch, he was thirstier than he could ever remember being in a very long time, and the light was helping none of this. He wanted nothing more than to go back to sleep until all the unpleasantness passed. Kenji groaned except no sound came, there was something big stuck in his throat. He couldn't breathe either; the something big was preventing it. He tried to pull it out, but he couldn't, he couldn't even lift his arms. They seemed to be paralyzed. This sent Kenji's mind into high gear and his eye's snapped open, immediately squinting against the blinding light coming from a window. He was in a room that was rather too white for comfort. This wasn't his room; this wasn't even a room in his house. Where the hell was he!? 

His eyes darted around as he tried to keep calm, it wasn't quite working. The sight of a figure sitting next to his bed brought an end to his panic, though. And for one insane minute it was Yuuki sitting there, head bowed, asleep in what had to be an uncomfortable position. As if the last couple of months had only been a bad dream, Kenji hoped, almost to a childish level, that it had. Then he blinked and the figure changed form, and Kenji knew he had been stupid to think it was Yuuki, she was dead, it would never be her again. He recognized the new figure immediately; knew the shorter, slighter form, the light brown hair cut short and boyish to belong to his old teammate, Amaya.

It didn't take long for Amaya to start awake, as if she had sensed herself being observed. She stared at Kenji wide eyed, her expression a mix of relief and something else Kenji couldn't match a name with, for a split second, before jumping up from her chair, nearly knocking it over. Her expression had changed to something of a combination of pained sadness and barely contained anger. She opened her mouth, "What were you thinking?!" she shouted.

Her words hit Kenji like a hammer to his skull, it hurt just as much. For a brief second Kenji wondered if he was actually going to get his wish of sleeping through his hangover, because if the pain in his head increased any more he's sure he's going to pass out.

"How could you be so irresponsible?!"

Kenji couldn't answer this, what with the breathing tube down his throat and all, so instead he stared back at her as she loomed over him in reply. It was then that Kenji noticed that for once in Amaya's life she stood head and shoulders taller than him. He wondered if somewhere deep inside Amaya was enjoying this fact, the thought made him want to laugh, but he didn't think he had it in him any more.

"You've been acting like this ever since…," Amaya paused and looked hesitant as if unsure she should bring _that_ subject up, "for the past months!" she amended. "It's not like you."

Kenji turned his eyes away from Amaya to stare up at the tiled ceiling. She was right, he hadn't been himself lately. But he had good reason, didn't he? He was justified! Wasn't he?

"What if you had really died?! You _almost_ did," and her voice became softer, the anger draining out of her expression and tone, hitching a little at the last word. "At one point you had stopped breathing. What if they hadn't been able to revive you? What about your children, what would have become of them?"

Kenji continued to stare at the ceiling; he watched memories of his children play out across it as if projected there by his mind. He saw the day his sons were born, their first words, their first steps. Saw them graduate from the academy and make Genin; saw them make Chunin, saw everything in between. He saw the day they found out they were having a girl, saw the first time he saw his daughter on ultrasound, heard her heart beat. Kenji's felt his chest tighten, another discomfort on top of everything else, but he couldn't find it in him to care anymore.

"Yuuki-san may be gone, but… but there are still people who need you," Amaya said firmly, her voice louder than before, but not as loud as when she had first begun.

Kenji saw the first time he met his wife, saw their marriage, saw everything they went through, good times and bad. His eyes began to sting, he ignored it.

"What are you trying to accomplish, Kenji? You came back from your last couple of missions pretty badly hurt and now this." Amaya swallowed and seemed to try to steel herself. When she spoke again it was in a voice just above a whisper, her words laced with a pain that cut into Kenji like a blade, "Are you trying to die?"

Kenji saw his sons; he saw their wide toothy smiles, saw his small daughter, and tried to imagine what her smile would look like. He tried to imagine what his children would look like when they grew up, and thought about how he would never see any of this if he died. His vision blurred and there was only the too white tiled ceiling again. Kenji didn't try to will the blurriness away, part of him didn't want to and part of him didn't care about ninja protocol anymore, didn't want to care ever. All the pain, all the sorrow spilt over then and rolled down the sides of his face to land on his pillow as wet spots. And at last, Kenji cried.

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Okay, so I lied, there was more than a bit of angst in this chapter. Oh well. And, I'll let the readers decide for themselves if Kenji was trying to literally drink himself to death and was in turn trying to die or if he just went overboard with the alcohol. 

So anyway, what do you think? I love to get reviews, they're my happy crack. I'll take constructive criticism, if you have any, too.

One last thing, in later chapters when major events like the Third Great Shinobi War and the Kyuubi Attack come about, I use this: http://heronite (dot) livejournal (dot) com/14164 (dot) html as a reference for event placement. You should check it out, it's amazing!

Oh yeah, and Gai comes in the next chapter.

Well, see you next chapter!


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